This invention relates to electronically controlled household sewing machines and, more particularly, to such a sewing machine having the capability for sewing a closed path pattern for applying a patch to a work fabric.
When a patch is applied to a work fabric, it is necessary to sew a substantially closed path connecting the perimeter of the patch to the work fabric. When such sewing is to be done by a sewing machine, certain problems are apt to arise. If the work fabric and the patch are relatively small, assuming the patch to be substantially rectangular in shape, the sewing machine operator can begin sewing at a corner of the patch, sew along one edge of the patch to another corner thereof, and with the needle penetrating the work fabric, pivot the patch and the work fabric and the sew along a second edge of the patch. This procedure may be repeated along all the edges of the patch. However, if the work fabric is relatively large, it may prove exceedingly cumbersome to turn the patch and work fabric without removing them from the sewing machine. Commonly, patches are sewn on tubular garments, for example at the elbow of a shirt sleeve or at the knee of a pant leg. A tubular garment may be sewn on a cylinder bed sewing machine but there is no way that the garment can be turned for longitudinal sewing along the axis of the tubular garment.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide a sewing machine with an arrangement for sewing a substantially closed path pattern on a work fabric.
To accomplish this objective, it would be desirable to have a sewing machine with a lateral feeding capability. Such capability in known in the prior art. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,561,382, to Ketterer et al, discloses a sewing machine having a removable cam mechanism which influences motion of the needle bar and needle attached thereto while in the work fabric, thereby to effect a lateral feeding of the work fabric. More recently, electronically controlled sewing machines have been developed, including those with a lateral feeding capability. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,123,981, to Brown, discloses an electronically controlled sewing machine wherein lateral feeding or a limited degree of lateral patterning is achieved by applying bight pattern information to the feed system and by applying arm shaft position sensor signals to the bight actuating circuit. While a skillful operator may learn to manipulate the controls of such a sewing machine to sew a substantially closed path pattern, it would be desirable to provide an arrangement wherein this capability is apparent to even the most unskilled of operators.
It is therefore a further object of this invention to provide an arrangement in an electronically controlled sewing machine for sewing a substantially closed path pattern of stiches, which arrangement is simple to learn and use.